MMORPG

A massive(ly) multiplayer online role-playing games or MMORPG is a multiplayer computer role-playing game that enables thousands of players to play in an evolving virtual world at the same time over the Internet . MMORPGs are a specific type of massive(ly) multiplayer online game (MMOG) .

Overview

Players run a client to connect to an MMORPG and someone else, usually the game's publisher , hosts the game world. Most MMORPGs are commercial and require the player to pay a monthly fee in order to play. The virtual worlds they create are called "persistent worlds", meaning that the world continues regardless of who is logged in or not. When a player logs in, they are represented in the game world by an avatar — a graphical representation of the character they play.

Most MMORPGs run several identical copies of the virtual world, called "shards" or "servers", that the player can choose from. They strive to allow the player to shape their own experience by providing multiple (or customizable) avatars that the player can use. MMORPG developers are in charge of supervising the virtual world and offering the users a constantly updated set of new activities and enhancements to guarantee the interest of players.

Most MMORPG are commercial in that a user must pay money for the client software and/or a monthly fee, in order to continually access the virtual world. Still, some totally free-of-charge MMORPG may be found on the Internet, although their quality is generally lower compared to commercial MMORPG. Some of the most popular commercial MMORPG report over 150,000 subscribers, including Ultima Online ( 1997 ), EverQuest ( 1999 ), Dark Age of Camelot ( 2001 ), Star Wars Galaxies ( 2003 ), and Final Fantasy XI (2003). South Korean MMORPGs claim the highest subscription numbers by far: Lineage and Ragnarok Online report millions of registered users. There are also several projects in development to create high-quality free MMORPGs, such as PlaneShift or Daimonin , or a free game engine for MMORPGs, such as Arianne .

Browser-based MMORPGs

With the success of the MMORPG genre in recent years, several multiplayer games played in web browsers have also begun using the MMORPG moniker. This largely text-based sub-genre developed from old BBS games and predates the modern idea of MMORPGs. Browser-based MMORPGs are usually simpler games than their graphical counterparts, typically involving turn-based play and simple strategies of "build a large army, then attack other players for gold", though there are many interesting variations on the popular theme to be found.